Between 1889 and 1949, the French Navy built a series of pre-dreadnought, dreadnought, and fast battleships, ultimately totaling thirty-four vessels: twenty-three pre-dreadnoughts, seven dreadnoughts, and four fast battleships. Another seven—five dreadnoughts and two fast battleships—were cancelled in various stages of construction (one of which was converted into an aircraft carrier while being built) and seven more were cancelled before work began. The first battleship construction program followed a period of confusion in strategic thinking in France over the optimal shape of the fleet. At the time, the French naval command consisted of competing factions, with one that favored building fleets of capital ships, continuing the program of traditional ironclad warships that had dominated the fleet in the 1860s and 1870s. The other major faction preferred the Jeune École doctrine, which emphasized the use of cheap torpedo boats to destroy expensive capital ships. During the period, naval construction decisions often depended on the Minister of the Navy in office at the time.

A pair of ironclad battleships were cancelled by Admiral Théophile Aube, an adherent of the Jeune École, but one of the two was redesigned as the pre-dreadnought Brennus following Aube's departure. By the end of the decade, the British Naval Defence Act of 1889 that considerably strengthened the Royal Navy provided the justification the battleship faction needed to embark on a similar naval expansion program. The French replied with the Statut Naval (Naval Law) of 1890 that projected a total force of twenty-eight battleships. The initial program ordered four ships, with a fifth added during the design process: Charles Martel, Carnot, Jauréguiberry, Masséna, and Bouvet. These were experimental ships, built to different designs but all to the same broad specifications; they were all characterized by pronounced tumblehome and a lozenge arrangement of a mixed-caliber main battery. All five proved to be disappointments, owing to poor stability and poor resistance to underwater attacks.

The navy then began a series of standardized ships designed by a single architect; these were the three Charlemagne class and the derivatives Iéna and Suffren. The initial series of French battleships saw relatively little activity, being primarily occupied with training activities through the 1890s and 1900s. They alternated between the Northern and Mediterranean Squadrons before being withdrawn from front-line service at the end of the first decade of the 20th century as more modern battleships entered service. In 1900, the French government passed a new Statut Naval to counter growing German naval strength, which resulted in the two République- and four Liberté-class battleships; they were very similar but differed in their secondary battery. These vessels proved to be much more successful than the earlier battleships of the French fleet, and they formed the backbone of the Mediterranean Squadron when war came in 1914.

A new Statut Naval in 1906 brought about the construction of the six Danton-class battleships and the seven dreadnoughts of the Courbet and Bretagne classes. The Dantons were pre-dreadnought vessels built after the launch of the British "all-big-gun" HMS Dreadnought rendered such vessels obsolescent, though the French at that time preferred the higher rate of fire of the lighter secondary guns. Convinced of the need to follow suit with dreadnoughts of their own, the French ordered the four Courbets in 1910 followed by three Bretagnes in 1912. These would be the last battleships completed for two decades, as World War I forced the French to cancel the Normandie and Lyon classes (ordered for the 1913 and 1915 programs) as industrial and financial resources were diverted to the French Army and financial limitations after the war prevented further construction. During the war, the bulk of the French fleet was occupied with guarding the southern end of the Adriatic Sea to contain the Austro-Hungarian Navy, while older vessels were used elsewhere, particularly during the Dardanelles campaign, where Bouvet was sunk in 1915. After the war, the surviving pre-dreadnoughts were either scrapped or reduced to secondary roles.

By the mid-1930s, the French again embarked on a naval construction program to counter the German and Italian fleets, resulting in the two Dunkerque-class battleships and fourRichelieu-class battleships; of the four Richelieus that were planned, two were cancelled by the start of World War II, and only one was completed in time to see action during the war. A final design, the Alsace class, was authorized in 1940 after the war began but were cancelled following France's defeat in the Battle of France. The two Dunkerques saw limited action during the war, with Dunkerque being sunk during the British attack on Mers-el-Kébir to prevent her from being seized by the Germans. Bretagne and Provence were also sunk there, and the third member of the class, Lorraine, was seized by the British and turned over to the Free French Naval Forces. Refloated and returned to Toulon, Dunkerque and Provence were later scuttled there with the former's sister ship Strasbourg when the French intentionally scuttled the fleet to prevent German soldiers from capturing the vessels. Richelieu meanwhile was overhauled in the United States and served with the Free French from 1943. Jean Bart, with only one main battery gun turret operational, briefly engaged United States forces during Operation Torch in November 1942, and was eventually completed in the late 1940s. Both she and Richelieu served as training ships before eventually being decommissioned in 1968.